Town rallies to say no to sniffing

On Friday the streets of the South Burnett Indigenous community of Cherbourg rang with drums, bells and children's voices. All the excitements was the annual SOS march, a public awareness raiser for the Cherbourg State School's Snuff Out Sniffing campaign.

Principal Peter Sansby says the march might be their big public event, but there is much more going on in the classrooms and the community to help local children say no to petrol sniffing.

"Every year we do a huge march around the town," Peter says. "We get our banners up, our deputy Bevan gets his drums and whistles out, and we go around the community bringing to everybody's notice the problem of sniffing and what detriment it has on the children."

The march is just the start of the program, which will run at the school throughout the year with help from South Burnett CTC, a nonprofit community organisation which provides employment, youth and disability services.

"The guys from CTC will come into the school and work with the kids closely in individual year levels to talk about sniffing, talk about the effects, what it does to your brain and your body.

"We also run programs about how to say no to sniffing, because that's really important, to be resilient. If your friends offer you the opportunity to sniff, you need to have the power to say no.

"Peer group pressure is not unique to Indigenous communities. Our kids are no different from anyone else."

Peter says the program, and even the march itself, is making a difference not only in the school but the wider community.

"When we start off the march, we have the children from the school and some parents and community members walking with us. As we go around the community we gather lots and lots of people, a few dogs, a couple of cars following us, older brothers and sisters who have left school come back and walk along.

"It's great to see the parents when we're out there on the walk, cheering the kids on and taking notice.

"It does make a difference. Maybe around the dinner table it just might be a conversation that crops up, and it might be that one conversation that stops a kid from dipping into the world of sniffing.